Last Man Standing
by Keri Maxwell
Summary: Sequel to Hopeless. Highly suggested that you read it first, but not necesary. Inu-yasha plans to undo the terrible things that have happened to Kagome, but when the time comes, will be be able to go through with it?


uh...hey all. this is the sequel (very angsty sequel) to hopeless. if you want to read it, either click on my pen name and find it, or copy and paste this address.  
  
http://www.fanfiction.net/read.php?storyid=1303729  
  
or you could just keep reading. im sure you'll figure out what happened. ::shrug::  
  
DISCLAIMER: yo no tengo inu-yasha. damn all lawyers. and my sister. because she wants to be a lawyer. don't kill me (or take my money)   
  
this will be highly highly depressing. you HAVE been bleeding warned, so don't kill me when you review.  
  
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Last Man Standing  
  
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The last man standing in a battle is obviously the victor.  
  
There is no one left to contend him, and he revels in his victory.  
  
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Inu-yasha knew he was half-demon. He also knew that half-demons were different from both humans and youkai for the ironic reason that he was both. Which is why it confused him, that at this particular moment in time, he felt no different from any other being that had ever walked the planet.   
  
He felt his helplessness.  
  
His despair.  
  
Grief.  
  
Regret.  
  
And Sadness.  
  
Everyone knows these in their life.   
  
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It started one day, centuries ago, when he was suddenly awakened from a tormented sleep. Awakened by a girl that he mistook for his 'killer', and a girl that would unconciously save him from his inhumanity. They were bound together in the strangest way, traveling to collect a sacred jewel. Throughout time, Inu-yasha grew to like her, and before long, he grew to love her.  
  
Along the journey, they met up with Sango, the last demon hunter of her village, Miroku, a monk with highly questionable morals, Shippo, the orphan kitsune. Though his being an orphan was not all the strange, everyone of them were, save Kagome.  
  
Yes, Kagome. She was the odd one. The girl from the future. Kikyo reincarnated. During her short time in the era, the people had tacked many titles onto her name. Lot of good they did her now.  
  
Kagome existed now only as a stone marker at the base of a large tree. Her family claimed she died in a car accident, but they knew the truth. Kagome had died fighting a terrible demon by the name of Naraku. And Kagome had died because her half-demon friend was unable to protect her. And Kagome would never come back.  
  
At least, not to them.   
  
Inu-yasha, after returning to his time in the past, began to think. He could live the centuries to Kagome's time. He could warn her, so she lived. So her future would be different and so his past would be changed. He could do it. Kagome and himself would get their second chance.   
  
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And so, weeks after Kagome died, Inu-yasha began to wait.   
  
The shards were collected, and the jewel was left to Miroku. He wished for it to go to it's rightful place, and it left.  
  
The following winter, Kaede fell sick, and passed in her sleep.   
  
Sango and Miroku finally married, now that Miroku was no longer driven by his need to find an heir. They had children, and Inu-yasha saw them grow up. In time, Sango and Miroku died, as did their children, and their children's children.   
  
Shippo became older, and finally advanced beyond his illusionary tricks to fight. He decided to go off on his own adventure, though he usually came back to visit. Eventually, he left the country, and the visits stopped.   
  
Kirara stayed in the family, so to speak. Sango and Miroku's family. She would stay with her current favorite, then be passed on to their children. Inu-yasha generally got along well with Kirara, so he visited her, and vice versa. But time took it's toll, and they both passed into obscurity in the other's mind.   
  
When Nobunaga came to power he wiped out many demons. The rest later killed each other off in a great and terrible war, lasting many decades, and spanning across the whole of Japan. Inu-yasha would have fought as well if not for his resolve to see Kagome again. So he laid low, and let the violence pass him by.  
  
Centuries passed.  
  
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Inu-yasha was there when Kagome was born, andbrought home to the shrine. In fact, he was there when the shrine was built, beginning with the well house, and continually added onto, until it became how he remembered it in what was no longer the future. Kagome became a little girl, who would play with her friends, wish to be famous, beg for new toys. Souta was born, and she became a big sister, resentful at first, then friendly, and protective. Inu-yasha saw their father. He was a good man, which made it all the worse when he was killed in a car accident not too long after Souta was born.  
  
This all too painfully reminded Inu-yasha of the day Kagome met her end. The downpour of rain, and blood, blood everywhere. The coldness that had gripped his heart then had lessened by this point, so it was now a dull pain. And it helped that he could see Kagome, full of life.   
  
He would tell her soon. Kagome was getting older. Now, she studied hard to get into a high school. Inu-yasha knew she would make it, even if he hadn't known her future. His time was coming, any day now.  
  
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When Kagome finally went down the well, Inu-yasha lay on the roof of her house, firmly resolved not to interfere yet. Kagome would have to meet him, as well as Shippo, Miroku and Sango. She would need to understand the dangers he was to save her from.  
  
On a not so special day, Kagome returned from her journey into the well. A few hours later, an irate half-demon followed her from that same well.   
  
Inu-yasha, once again watching from the roof, felt a very strange thing at this point. An issistant tugging, pulling him. Inu-yasha tried to resist it, but it only became stronger, until he had no choice but to let it take him. As soon as he did this, he found the world going past him at an extremely fast pace, and when it stopped, he found himself looking through his own eyes.   
  
This may not seem strange, everyone looks through their own eyes. But this, he was not in control of. What he saw was a memory of something he had done. His first trip through the well. Speaking harsh words to a girl, who moments ago was fully enjoying her oden. Dragging her with him, having his ears petted, then finally taking her through the well. Just when he expected to see the blue light that signified the travel between the times, he found himself back on the roof of the Higurashi home.   
  
This confused Inu-yasha to end, not to mention frustated him, but eventually he came to the obvious conclusion that two of the same thing simply couldn't exist at once.  
  
No matter. He could tell Kagome some time when his past self wasn't here.   
  
And Inu-yasha continued to wait.  
  
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Inu-yasha knew he should make his move soon. Kagome had met Shippo, Miroku and Sango. She knew all the circumstances. When he looked at her, he wanted her to live. But a though grew in his mind, and it made him doubt himself.   
  
Should he mess with time?   
  
What if he did warn Kagome, and she heeded his warning and stayed in her time until the danger passed? Would she be killed at some later date in the same fasion? Say that never happened, and she lived. Would his past self realize how he couldn't live without her? And if he did realize it, would Inu-yasha, as he was now, remeber any of it? Even if he did remember it, he could not return to the past now. He hadn't jumped through the well. He had lived all this time and memories cannot be reversed.   
  
If she stayed in this era, with this Inu-yasha, would the past one come to interfere? Of course he would. And at that point, this Inu-yasha would be pulled into himself, without and control over the actions of his more naive and reckless self. Kagome could seal the well to keep his old self away, but then he never would have lived to see, and that would ruin the whole plan.   
  
This was so confusing.  
  
Going back, would she even believe him? Would Kagome think he was some trick of Naraku's, keeping her away while the others were in danger? Would she see it as a prank of his and sit him? The rosary never left his neck and still worked, seeing as she had died before removing it.   
  
Inu-yasha felt helpless, being unable to think of anything that was better than the situation he was already in. Despair was eating away at him, and he began to regret his decision to see Kagome again.  
  
The days passed by and Inu-yasha waited in bitter anticipation. The dreaded day was coming, and he didn't know if he could go through with what he had been planning for all these centuries. Inu-yasha was pulled into himself more and more frequently, and the times that it happened, most of the experiences were happy ones.   
  
And all at once, his time drew to a close, and the day Kagome died was upon him.  
  
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Inu-yasha wasn't sure how he knew it was that day, but he didn't doubt for a second that it was. Kagome sat in her room, studying for a test she was never going to take. She was stressing over a math problem, and Inu-yasha had a strange urge to yell at her to forget it. It didn't matter, she was as good as dead in less than three hours! But he stayed where he was, and watched her.   
  
Sometime in the early afternoon, Kagome rose from her desk, closed her books, packed her giant yellow back pack, and headed out to the well house.   
  
Inu-yasha's mind screamed at him, telling him to stop her, let her live, give her another chance. His heart screamed that he should give himself a chance. But something deep within him told him in a calm voice that it was useless. Kagome would die, and they would never be together.   
  
Kagome entered the well house.  
  
In this intant Inu-yasha threw all thoughts from his mind, jumped off the roof, ran to the well house, and threw the doors open, only to see a glimpse of her black hair before she fell below the lip of the well. And Inu-yasha knew the deal was done.   
  
His last chance was gone.  
  
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A while later, the insistant tugged yanked Inu-yasha into his body once more, and he suffered through a repeat of seeing Kagome's family cry and accuse, and it hurt all the worse to know that he could have prevented it. When the Inu-yasha of the past returned to his time, the Inu-yasha of the present took up a seat in the Goshinboku tree to brood. He told himself that what he had done was right, it had to happen, there was no alternate, even when it felt so wrong.   
  
He had been living soley on his determination to see Kagome alive again, to save her, and now it was gone.   
  
Days past, and the tugging returned. Inu-yasha watched the stone marker, felt the bitterly cold rain, heard his words again, and drowned in the grief.   
  
It was too much to bear again.  
  
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Inu-yasha's past self never returned after that, and he knew it never would again. He watched Kagome's family until her grandfather died, her mother died, and finally, Souta died as well, but not before going to school, having a career, finding a wife and having children.   
  
The last man standing in life is obviously the defeated.  
  
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don't bleeding hurt me!!! . i didn't want to make something that sad! well, i thought it was sad. it was sad right? utterly depressing. inu-yasha seems kinda OOC to me...maybe cause there's no dialouge...huh. but that was intentional. he had no one to talk to right? another point. um...so....don't kill me....please please please..... ::braces self::  
  
c|_| Keri Maxwell (haha haven't done the coffee cup in a while) 


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